In general, short range communication technologies operate in short distances. Such technologies include for example Bluetooth, WLAN (wireless local area network), UWB (ultra-wideband, WUSB (wireless USB) and Wibree.
Short range communication technologies have enabled development of so called smart space environments. The definition of a smart space is many-sided, many times related to ubiquitous computing and smart networking. The term smart space is used herein to refer to a certain space that handles information in a somewhat smart way, either so that devices of the space are for example sharing information relating to connectivity, configuration, security or that the devices are sharing even information relating to actual data in an interoperable manner. In practice a smart space may be a relatively simple system or quite the opposite, a very complex system.
Basically in every smart space there is a Service Provider (SP) and a Service User (SU) and a way how the SP and SU can connect (or interconnect) with each other. This is depicted in FIG. 1. In a simple form, the SP can be for example a Bluetooth printer and the SU for example a mobile terminal, and these devices are interconnected by a Bluetooth connection. This kind of example is easy to handle and can be built upon one connectivity technique. However, generally the SP could offer services over any type of connectivity technique. On the other hand, in some cases, the SP can utilize only some or none of them. How to find proper connectivity technique in this case is more complicated. Furthermore, there may be more than one SPs and SUs. Yet furthermore, mobile devices set limits for powering issues, which further complicates connectivity solutions.
As introduced above, devices in a smart space are operating in a “smart” manner. Ideally all devices are aware of the space, devices and services that are available and allowed to be used. A problem that is not fully considered in current implementations is how to easily adapt to changes in the environment, for example when entering a smart space or when moving from one smart space to another. For example, if a user moves to a meeting room, the user may want to obtain information pertaining to devices/services available in the meeting room. The user may want to know for example, which devices it may connect to (wired or wireless), how it should connect to those devices (available bearers, hidden names, password, security etc.), which services are available through the devices, and which services the user is allowed to use in the devices (e.g. wireless LAN connection, wireless projector etc.).
One known way of sharing smart space information, for example for persons entering the smart space, is to share it with paper notes or verbally. This kind of approach is however somewhat inconvenient, because paper notes get easily lost or it may be difficult to find the right person who is aware of available services in certain space.
Another option is that a device entering a smart space scans the surroundings to discover devices of the smart space and to find out, which bearers the devices have, which services are provided via them, and how to connect with them. Basically, the entering device has to scan the surroundings with each available bearer it has in order to find out whether there are any devices which use any of the available bearers. Because there is no standardized way to arrange this, each bearer has to be activated for a certain period of time to find out other devices. Due to powering issues and possible interference problems between concurrently operating radio technologies it may not be possible to use several bearers at the same time to find out connectivity information of the multiple other devices located in the smart space. This kind of scanning operation consumes a lot of power and may require significant amount of time. The result may yet be that not every device/service in the smart space is discovered.
Still another related solution is disclosed in “Using OWL in a Pervasive Computing Broker” by Harry Chen, Tim Finin and Anupam Joshi, available in http://www.csee.umbc.edu/pub/finin/papers/aamas03a.pdf. In the disclosed system, there are RFID sensors embedded in the walls of a smart space. As a person enters the smart space the RFID sensors detect that for example a cell phone belonging to that person has entered the space. Thereafter the smart space may be adapted to presence of that person. However, this kind of approach requires complicated arrangements within the smart space to provide the means to detect the presence of incoming and outgoing devices, which may make the arrangement costly and not being flexible to changes in configuration of the smart space.